Style Guide

Table of Contents

• Functions: Member functions vs Static functions
• Namespace functions
• Return values
• Enumeration

The scripting environment is composed of two main elements:

• Class: To describe a specific object (such as SPoly) with a set of related functions (such as SPoly.GetTrianglesNumber)
• Namespace: A set of functions grouped around a single theme (such as STexturingUtil)

Most of scripting classes inherit from SComp which represents a generic object and contains common functions such as SComp.GetBoundingBox().

Functions: Member functions vs Static functions

While browsing the documentation, you may encounter three types of functions:

• Static functions
• Member functions
• Namespace functions

A member function refers to a class instance, therefore it can only be called from class objects and not from their class name.
It is called through the following syntax: VariableName.MemberFunction().

var newPt = SPoint.New();
var x = newPt.GetX(); // Valid syntax
var x = SPoint.GetX(); // Invalid syntax 

A static function is a class function, therefore it can only be called from its class and not class objects themselves.
It is called through the following syntax: ClassName.MemberFunction().

var myPoint = SPoint.New(); // Valid syntax
var point = myPoint.New(); // Invalid syntax 

Static functions are identifiable in documentation thanks to keyword "static" at the beginning, such as SPoint.FromSel.

Namespace functions

Namespaces contain functions that are not linked to a specific object or class.
It can be seen as a place to store functions having a common field of application.
The code syntax is similar to static functions.

// Get the selected sphere object
var theSphere = SSphere.FromSel()[0];
// Call the global function Convert from the SCADUtil namespace, to convert the sphere to a CAD object
var ret = SCADUtil.Convert(mySphere);

Note

The ScriptUtil namespace is a specific case.
For convenience purpose, all methods from this namespace have to be called without the namespace name:

ZoomAll();

Return values

Most of data processing methods (except constructors for instance) follow a common scheme, they return a map containing:

• the error code, indicating if the function succeed or not
• the list of output objects if any

The function SPoly.Explode illustrates this rule:

var myPoly = SPoly.FromSel()[0];
var ret = myPoly.Explode();
 
var returnCode = ret.ErrorCode;
var explodedPolyTbl = ret.PolyTbl;
 
print("Return code: " + returnCode);
print("Number of polys: " + explodedPolyTbl.length);

Enumeration

An enumeration provides access to a set of predifined values that can be used as functions parameters.
For readability purpose, they are always written in upper case.

var myCloud = SCloud.FromName("My Cloud")[0];
myCloud.SetCloudRepresentation(SCloud.CLOUD_INSPECTION);